was footloose man you can't always get what you want you can't always get what you want ut if you try some time ♪ 2:00 easternat time, president trump will give a speech about prescription drug prices. live coverage on c-span. on c-span2 at 9:00 a.m., the u.s. commission on civil rights hosts discussions about how the federal government should respond to hate crimes. c-span3, the annual consumer assembly from the consumer federation of america, beginning consumerchair of the product safety commission and a discussion about modernizing the electric grid. live coverage starting at 9:00 [video clip] >> we are unlocking new

opportunities for prosperity and for peace. all of these changes are happening because america is being respected again. ♪ good morning everyone on this friday, may 11. president trump last night at a rally in indiana, saying america is respected again, touting its foreign-policy a, schmitz to a crowd of more than 7000. we turn to all of you this morning to get -- accomplishments to a crowd of more than 7000. we turned all of you this morning to get your views. .emocrats, (202) 748-8000 republicans, (202) 748-8001. independents, (202) 748-8002. you can also comment on twitter at @cspanwj and on facebook at

facebook.com/cspan. you can start dialing in now. president trump last night at a rally for senate candidate mike braun, running against joe ,onnelly, the incumbent democratic incumbent in the midterm election. here is more from the president on his foreign-policy compliments at that rally last night. -- accomplishments last night. [video clip] >> at 2:00 in the morning, i had the honor of greeting three brave americans that had been held in north korea, and we welcomed them back home the proper way. applause]d in singapore, i will be meeting with kim jong-un to pursue a future of peace and security for the world, for the whole world. [cheering]

and the relationship is good, but you remember everybody in the fake news, when they were saying he is going to get us into a nuclear war. he is going to get us into a nuclear war. [booing] and you know what gets you into nuclear wars and you know what gets you and to other wars? weakness. weakness. [cheers and applause] the relationship is good and hopefully for all of us, the world, hopefully something very good is going to happen, and they understand it is very important for them. it is important for everybody. japan, south korea, china, everybody -- i think it is going to be a very big success. isn't, ok?sn't, it

if it isn't, it isn't -- but you have to have that because you do not know. we are not going to be walking into in iran deal where the negotiator john kerry refused to leave the table. [booing] host: president trump talking about progress made with north korea. inside this article, while mr. trump has said the u.s. demand in the talks is the complete and irreversible denuclearization of north korea, mr. kim described the upcoming summit as an "excellent first step toward promotion of the positive development on the put read peninsula -- korean peninsula and the building of a good future. -- good future." bonnie glasser said that while

the release of the detainees was not mixed licit precondition for a meeting, the north koreans understood they had to do it for any progress to be made. director john brennan said the chances of success in singapore are the probably less than .01%. when mr. kim is trying to do is get sanctions relaxed. i think he is being quite masterful. what do you think? tennis, democrat. good morning. caller: how are you doing? host: doing well. caller: what do you think of the president's diplomacy? host: i think -- caller: i think it is ok, but i have an issue with the way the republican congress allows the president to say and do anything he wants, and at the time of all of this glory, everything is ok, but they don't say anything about anything else that he does. host: you think so far, when it

comes to foreign policy, as a democrat, you think he is making positive steps? it seems that way, but you don't know until it is all said and done. this president will be judged on a lot of other things other than his policies, foreign policies. washington, utah, independent. you are on the air. caller: good morning. -- i feel that everything comes out of his mouth and that he has to say is great and stuff like that, he just repeats what he says. not proper, and he lives, he does not -- he says he is the smartest person in the whole wide world. just ask him. wrong.

he is a liar, a thief, and in my opinion he is like hitler. that about theay president? what has he done that is even the equivalent of those people you are mentioning? hitler was a killer and had the gift of gab. a lot of people bought his it was greed, he wanted to wipe out the jewish because he was expended by them plus he is a and liar, a thief. everything that comes out of his mouth is a lie or oh, i did not say that. host: johnny in virginia, a

democrat. caller: hi, i'm on? host: you are on the air. what do you think about the president? caller: if people would only draw some films back from world war ii and before and after, and look at mussolini. is a model of mussolini. all you have to do is look and see the act in his face. this man is a devil. he might have been sent here by i don't know what. and people believe him. host: why, johnny? why call him that? caller: because his history, this recent history proves what he is. i'm not saying it for me, i hang -- m saying it for the people that know this. host: what is the proof? caller: the proof is a school that was not any good. people that do not -- people

that work for him do not get paid, and the man is evil. he calls people all kinds of names and stuff and mocks crippled people. this guy is something else. host: johnny in virginia. -- in new jersey, a den independent. what do you think? caller: i think this guy is brilliant. you see what he did with kim jong-un? he is giving him all the credit and he is the guy making the , and, and he is -- peace he is going to bring the china and japan, koreans, together. he is telling china you are stealing our stuff, you have been doing it for a long time, and he knows how to negotiate all of that to keep peace, and he will give them what they want and we will get back what we deserve, the rights and everything, and he is going to do the same thing in the middle east.

listen -- i was watching mcmahon,, and linda her husband runs wrestling. she went into saudi arabia, and they are going to bring that place together because he is going to put people to work. when you put people to work, people do not need to work for the government. right now, we have too many people working for the government. they do not want to let go of their jobs, but once he gets the becauseorking out here, he is negotiating from strength -- once he gets these people working out here, nobody is going to want to work for the government. host: on the china front, from the wall street journal, china finds ways to delay accepting u.s. exports. california fruit are among the goods piling up at a chinese ports. the result of increased that china is using to remind america how important its market is to exporters.

oranges, lemons, cherries from california, and apples have been eating at -- sitting at chinese than normallonger as officials spend more time inspecting the fruits for pests and decay. fruit is also becoming -- coming inspectionvigorous as the tensions no sign of easing. the chinese are trying to identify sectors or industries that could put pressure on the administration to change its posture. in april, beijing increased tariffs on fruit, including -- ns and limes, 226% from 26% and cherries 25%. thesear is that complications could push chinese importers to look for fruit suppliers outside the u.s..

ford, it hasase of left these cars stuck at the port in recent weeks, raising storage costs for ford as they scribbled figure out how they can be checked in a more practical way. a ford spokesman declined to comment, beyond saying the company was monitoring the situation. don, independent. oh, i'm sorry. i did not realize we already talked to you. we are going on to orlando, florida, democrat. good morning. what you think about trump's diplomacy? caller: i think is diplomacy is to go to war. to me, he has not done anything with what he said on the campaign trail. he said he would build the wall -- no wall. he said he was going to do health care, no health care. he said he would bring back jobs -- no jobs.

-- it iseft mexico still in mexico. he is constantly lying since day one. everybody forgot about trump university, everybody forgot about small businesses in atlantic city. he was supposed to pay for the work and never did it. his moral compass is totally warped, and i believe that his supporters, it is going to get egg on his face when it is all said and done. host: altra in tennessee. your thoughts? caller: i just want to say how much i love our president, and i appreciate all the good things he has been doing for our country. we all have flaws in our character, but that is not what counts. i believe donald trump really loves the people and he wants to help america, and he wants to make us great again.

to be an american. i love my country, i love my lord, and i love our president. i pray for him every day. that is what we need to do. we need to pray for our leaders, god willem, that give them wisdom to run the country the right way. host: altra in tennessee, a republican. your thoughts on the president's diplomatic efforts across the board -- north korea, iran, the paris climate deal, trade. what are your thoughts on this? he also brought up his 2:00 a.m. visit to andrews air force base yesterday to greet the american prisoners that were released by north korea. he talks to reporters as well when he landed at the tarmac -- when he was at the tarmac with the prisoners at andrew air

force base. reaction from democratic leader chuck schumer of new york. here is what he had to say on the floor yesterday. [video clip] the return celebrate of the three americans for the sake of their freedom and their families, we should not feel like we need to give kim jong-un anything in return. it is so troubling to hear president trump say that kim jong-un treated the americans excellently. kim jong-un is a dictator. detainediously american citizens, rob them of their freedom, do not let them .o home to their families their release should not be exalted, it should be expected. it is no great compliment of kim jong-un to do this. when the president does it, he weakens american foreign-policy

and puts americans at risk around the world. if other adversaries look at what the president has said in reaction to kim jong-un, why shouldn't they detain american citizens and get a huge pat on the back when they release them? it is like so many of the president's foreign policy action -- quick, not thought through, related to show and to ego. when nations, if our adversaries, from iran to china, who think they can get something -- praise, standing, -- by concessions by unlawfully detaining people in their country? administration -- we are all rooting for diplomacy to succeed on the korean peninsula, but we cannot

sacrifice the safety of american citizens around the world in exchange for an illusory veneer of peace. schumer, the democratic leader in the senate, on the floor yesterday, critical of the president's diplomacy efforts. what do you think jack houston, texas, independent. caller: can you repeat the question? host: what do you think of the president's diplomacy? it is: i think magnificent. i'm a native new yorker, i live in texas. fromerstand his mind growing up in new york city. i know just how he thinks. people are jealous. i'm not saying he is a perfect person, by no means is he perfect, but who is perfect? today he is a master of diplomacy and maybe he does not tell the truth regarding his personal life, but i believe he does tell the truth regarding our country and everything he is trying to achieve and he is achieving, and i highly respect

him. that is my opinion. host: when you say he is a master, why do you think that? caller: look at the way he works around the clock. a person at his age, you would think this guy would get some sleep. but he is a master communicator and he can hold an audience based on his tremendous his ability -- you know, his ability -- more than anything, he is a patriot. that is what i want to say. more than anything to me, he is a real american patriot. host: warren in texas. less in philadelphia, democrat. caller: good morning. thank you for c-span. thatt wanted to express there needs to be peace in the diplomacy his type of does not seem to be strengthening peace to help the

people of earth to be united. we are blessed because god has given us enough to share for all earthlings of the world. divisive, andn so people are treating him like he is some kind of a cult leader. i am hoping that in november, when the people have the chance to vote, they can help change this common concept of divisiveness. the only way we can save the andd is if we get together push this blue wave that is dissolve thisp us to bring peace,

and love back to the world. there is a selfishness going on thathat they feel immigrants and other people are not the same. we are all earthlings. we want to be at peace on god's earth. we want to save the earth. the only way we can help this situation is please, people, bring your votes to november and get these republicans who are complicit or who are helping divisive in this country. host: all right, we heard your point. the washington times this morning calls trump's diplomacy bold. israel has a new capital and the world did not end. the foreign-policy establishment has no use for mr. trump and has a vested interest in what it has established. from big ideas, like the united nations and wto's, down to the

dishonest policies, studied ambiguity over the location of the capital of israel. supposed to be a bargaining chip for a final deal with the palestinians, and sticking to a failed assumption can stunt the imagination and render it impossible to see how things can be different in better -- and better. the world did not end when the president took the united the paris climate deal. when president trump took his time affirming the mutual defense principle for all nato the hyperventilating and fainting spells from the establishment or something to behold. he eventually got around to it, after putting the fear of god into freeloaders. they were told they have to pay their own fair share of their own defense. the president was lectured that his tough talk and resolve would get us into a shooting war with kim jong-un. now they have a new date to talk saye in singapore, analysts

trump is in over his head and is bound to be negotiated by the wily north koreans. they say president trump must temper his enthusiasm to deliver peace for a waiting world while remembering kim is not the excellent and honorable leader the president has said he is, content to let his people starve. the president will have the reliable voices of secretary of state mike pompeo and john bolton in his ear, so model talk to mr. netanyahu and well done to mr. trump. fortune favors the bold, and american diplomacy is more effective for it. what do you think? your thoughts on the president's diplomacy this morning in our first hour of the washington journal. on youre lines are screen. keep dialing in. jason in florida, republican. hi, jason. hi.er: for all of those people that keep talking bad about trump, i

want to let you know that i actually voted for obama because he promised all of these things. he promised this change, this change, that change. nothing changed. nothing changed. and he actually made it worse. yes, this president right now in the first 16 months has done aid did in the last four years. he fixed more than he did in the past eight years. because why, he is not a politician? the cozy is donald trump? himyone is hating on because he is donald trump. ok, he is donald trump, but he is donald trump. respect that. i hate that everybody is doing it. i respected our president when he was obama the first four years, but he did not do anything that he said he was going to do.

this is so backwards. host: jason, may i ask how old you are? caller: i thank you, c-span, for showing the truth, because all of these other nations are crab. thank you. are you still there? are you still there? caller: yes. host: how old are you? caller: i am 41. host: what do you do? caller: i run my own business. host: were you a democratic before you voted for trump? caller: i was independent, i voted democrat to vote for obama, and after obama's second term, i voted for the utah guy. host: mitt romney. caller: and then i voted for trump after that. because obama never cashed in anything that he said he was going to do. he gave me so much high hopes and then nothing in the first

four years. everything he said he was going to do, not one single freaking thing happened. host: understood. ron in pennsylvania, independent. ron in sunnyhis is arizona. host: oh, you are in arizona. good morning. caller: how are you? host: good. caller: i am watching this from my hospital bed. i just had open heart surgery, and i want to thank the to givet to think me -- me that access. it saved my life. these people who are shutting him down are wrong. it is not very patriotic and they should be ashamed of themselves. if we let this pan through, it is going to work out. things take time, and time is on our side. ron's thoughts in arizona. we wish you a speedy recovery. korea, will the wall

street journal has north korean denuclearization -- north korea has a couple of headlines. returned, and below damagehe headline is the to the nuclear site is worse than thought. the damage to the nuclear site is worse than earlier assessment showed. space-based radar showed that it after the initial impact of the latest nuclear test in september, a much larger part of this test site caved in over the following hours and days. the study was conducted by researchers from singapore, germany, china, and the u.s.. this means that a large domain has collapsed around the test site, not merely a tunnel or two. the research feeds into a -- an international -- and leading up to last months in a korean summit in the meeting in singapore on june 12. some u.s. officials and experts to the closure as a significant concession, while others argue that the site is unusable and

its dismantling is therefore an empty gesture designed to gain leverage in negotiation with oul and washington. sean, go ahead. good morning to you. >> good morning. i am calling regarding the diplomacy of our president. i feel like he should act an adult, or like our parents. --do not want to be acting the parents should not be acting like kids, so the kids learn bad stuff from them. we want the president to be the same way, but he is acting like a childish brat. like i understand being the president and [inaudible]

i get that. but when you are in a higher office, you are supposed to be noted at as a role model, like a bully in an office where you can bully anybody. what are other countries going to look at? him praise about north korea. he made them come to the table, but what about iran? he should be building on that starting over. that, butworks like sometimes you have to work on the things in the past. guest: -- and pennsylvania, republican. what do you think? caller: hello? host: what do you think about the president's diplomacy? caller: hello? host: doug, you are on the air. i am trying to say that

we have had the best president america has ever had, and i will tell you something. americans better wake up, because he is going to straighten out the country. he is going to make the best thing for this country. all of the others have done nothing but politicians and lied to the people, and they always have these one things. if you are stupid enough to vote for me, what do i care? god bless america and god bless donald trump. host: portland, tennessee. independent. caller: thank you for taking my call. i was a donald trump voter myself, why i am calling independent. i can tell who watches fox news and who gets on the internet and right side of the argument. i suggest to everybody watching that they take more information terms --r sources in

sources. in terms of respect the president -- trust, honesty, communication is how you respect the president. he rippedf diplomacy, up the iran deal, but he never has a second plan. he forces everybody to believe that he is the man. wait a couple of months and see. thank you. on the iran deal, on the front page of the wall street journal, u.s. raises pressure on the country. they took a step from cutting iran off, levying sanctions on a financial network and accusing the central bank of helping funnel u.s. dollars to the ed elite military unit known as the quds force. they opposed several sanctions on iranian companies, and in officials -- the sanctions were the first since president donald trump pulled out of the landmark iran nuclear deal and announced

a return to economic crippling sanctions against tehran. these were representative of a move toward cutting off the to dollars.ss and more on the iran deal, here is stephen johnson writing a piece in the wall street journal -- excuse me, in the new york morning.s stephen steinman's was the national security director for north africa from 2011-2012. europe should stand up to trump, is what they write. do to get mr.e trump's attention? president has on rouhani of iran has indicated that his country will continue to it here to the terms of the deal for the time being and deal with other parties to it in hopes of securing its benefits. this confers on the european union, britain, and france, all someich are parties --

leverage. acknowledging around compliance and continuing business with iran would mitigate the effect of the sanctions. the ministry should challenge might prompt europe to go for there. the european union could announce that withdrawal of member states ambassadors from the united states. isn't this what states do when diplomatic partners breach solemn agreements, expose them to security risk and threaten to wreak havoc on their economies? that is what the trump administration is threatening to do by courting the risk of a middle eastern war and by applying secondary thanked and european companies. depending on the american response, european capitals might follow up with the expulsion of american ambassadors. the white house would face the first our choice in this whole process -- a full-blown crisis in transatlantic relations. if the administration's next move was to impose secondary sections on europe, the europeans could lack their own penalties on american multinational corporations, which would place additional pressure on the right house.

-- white house. b ron case is different. is ae is at odds -- iran different case. and, theoes not european union storm at foreign policy, we might start referring to it as the 20th colonies rolled from across the ocean. this is not an outcome the united it should welcome -- as britain learned in 1939, it is a lot better to have allies than colonies. their piece in today's new york times. what do you think? roger inver genia, a democrat. go ahead. in virginia,nia -- a democrat. go ahead. caller: i do not know really where to start this morning. vote for told me to this guy, and all this guy does is spread hate. i called tbn and ask them to

play for barack obama. pray forime did they him, but my pastor can stand up in front of me in church and say vote for donald trump. i have lived under republican rules so long, [inaudible] have black lung, but it is not big enough to be compensated for. i have a wife who is sick and i do not have health care. what is donald trump doing but dividing our nation? is anybody awake out there in this land? that would be my question out there this morning. forget about the great donald trump doing a big show. one, the cameras, all of that? it is not nothing but a show. put social security on the table to bring the nation together with republicans. they fought him for eight years.

not one time with a cut a deal with that man. in the our democrats house and the senate are supposed to compromise and be good to this guy? where's the sanity in america? are you a wake? -- a wake? -- awake? host: good morning, floyd. caller: good morning. served 20 plus years in the military. i work in the private sector and i work for the government. landder why the law of the does not apply to mr. donald trump? he came out of new york and everybody came out of new york connected to russia. they are all thugs and gangsters.

the evangelicals are following him and they have given him a pass, they forgive him. i want america to know -- i would like to have an answer -- what do they tell their children? what do you tell your children about your president in the united states? how you address that? that is my word. thank you. host: john in georgia, a republican. john, the president's diplomacy. that is our conversation this morning. what do you think. yes ma'am, good morning. i think donald trump is doing a pretty good job. not -- he is not a politician, he talks with his hands and he talks pretty rough, but in his roughness he is serious. he has nothing to gain. politicians in the past and politicians in the present are really not for the people.

if they wanted to free our deficit, we would be out of the deficit. has suchump -- he patients with north korea and he is serious about iran. he has only been in office for a year and a half. president obama was eight years. i do not know how any of these people talk prior to me can expect donald trump to make up for eight years of what has been done in less than two years? i don't understand it. john, he has reversed several obama administration policies, including this recent decision to withdraw from the iran nuclear deal. did you agree with him on that decision, to withdraw from the wrong -- iran nuclear deal? caller: he has not seen it with his eyes. he has to depend on the people under him to say yes.

israel said something about they had a lot of proof that iran has got things going on. i assume that president trump's administration, the powers that be under him have done some research, just like colin powell weapons of mass destruction when the war started. by who is under you to give you this advice? and then he makes the decision with his chief of staff or his administration. john there in georgia. on the iran nuclear deal, related to that is what is happening in syria between israel and iran. israel hits a targetsets in -- iran in syria, israel says a ron fired first. we will have that discussion coming up on washington journal of the top of the new york times this morning, the bigger conflict behind the cross-border clashes in syria. a question was raised -- was

trump's announcement a factor in this new fighting? this escalated date after president trump announced the withdrawal from the deal in toronto. israel had railed against the agreement since its inception. president trump had campaigned on the promise of withdrawing from it. the concern now is that the shadow war israel and iran have been waiting for years, most recently in syria under the cover of the civil war, has burst into the open. it is not a proxy war, and that particularly it dangerous, said a former united states ambassador to israel. israel and iran have been in a cold war for 20 years, but now it is out in the open, direct, connecticut engagement between the forces, with iranian casualties mounting. the potential for escalation is much greater now than it was before. he said that mr. trump's announcement might have not helped, but that was the stage thethe conflict -- that

stage for the conflict was set earlier this year. installed air defense systems that can reach into israel. ,nd in the papers this morning this is the front page of the washington times. israel escalates, iran hostility hits military position. in the united states has endorsed israel's right to self-defense. yesterday, the foreign minister is a russia and germany held a news conference. here is what they had to say. [video clip] >> we are greatly concerned decision to withdraw from the decision. this is a violation of a u.n. resolution, which approved this plan and made it part of international law.

we appreciate the measured approach by the iranian leadership in this matter. it is necessary to assess all the consequences of this step taken by washington, and hate would be counterproductive in this situation. france, theany, u.k., china, and iran, we have to do this assessment, and we are already doing that. soon we will compare our views on this matter. i would only like to point out a few points which are important here. you said, what steps can be taken to protect iran from the consequences of u.s. sanctions? this would be a simpler stick approach, because what we are talking about here -- simplistic approach, because what we are talking about here is not resuming anti-iranian sanctions. unilateral sanctions by the u.s., there is nothing we can do about that.

this hasme time, the sanctionswith imposed by the un security council. this has nothing to do with that. the u.s. unilateral sanctions, if washington tries to apply these restrictions extra-territorially, this will disrupt the situation in the with the eu, the u.k., russia, so we will assess this, among other things, from the viewpoint of several standards. like i said, the deal is not just about lifting sanctions. this deal, as they call it, the joint conference a plan of comprehensive plan of action, it is also about stabilizing the region. the most important aspect of it

is to strengthen the nonproliferation regime. the damage done to this achievement is yet to be assessed, but it is significant. foreigne russian minister held a joint news conference with his counterpart from germany. we want -- we covered that if you want to watch the entire thing. russia, china, germany, france, the u.s., the u.k. all part of this nuclear deal. now, the president has withdrawn from the agreement. we are getting your thoughts on the president's diplomacy. what do you think about it? mike in virginia, independent. caller: i will comment on the israel thing and i will comment on the diplomacy. israel is like a little dog. they will bite and bite and cause us to get into that war, and it will happen. secondly, about his diplomacy --

the north korean dictator is going to get something for nothing. if we sit around and say that donald trump is a good man, everyone he drained from the swamp, they are stealing money. all of this money is being old people,d, and watch your social security. he will have you eating dog food before it is over. victor in illinois, republican. you are next. caller: i want to make a comment. about mr. trump. it is hard for me to say president trump, i will say mr. trump. mr. trump, people keep forgetting about before the election. let's go back to the election. everyone in america is always forgetting about who this man

really is. this is a man that made fun of rds, this is a man that had locker room talk, and everybody forgets about this stuff. i have no proof use stealing money in washington and moving it to the rich people, but this --a man who talks grady crazy on twitter. we can go on and on, but his history -- is this the president? an ideal person we have to call mr. president? are you kidding me? where is america going? presidents like truman and obama -- everything that obama did they bring it up. why can't we bring it up when trump does it? it important for you to bring that up rather than talk about his diplomacy? caller: because his diplomacy and his character affects our diplomacy. the rest of the world looks as

at hisracter -- character, who he is, and it affects us. it is like having a gang banger being the president. you don't think that would affect diplomacy? int: victor, a republican illinois. in the washington post, a column -- why mccain morally opposes gina haspel for the cia and why it matters. he writes about her testimony this week, and he writes that she was asked to elaborate about the stricter moral standard she supports, the 33-year-old -- that is a typo -- she is usually one years old, she leaned on the letter of the law like a crutch. she promised she would not revive -- oh, the 33-year-old , we know the law like a crutch. she promised she would not revive the cia's

interrogation program, even if ordered to by trump, because she fully supports the current standards for detainee treatment required by law. the republican-controlled congress passed an amendment to the 2016 national defense authorization act, porter backed by mccain, which imitate interrogation techniques to those contained in the army field manual 2-22.3. that version exquisitely rejected practices such as waterboarding, forcing detainees to pose in a sexual manner, and placing the door sacks over the heads of detainees. break -- ed not to the bigger news is that she said she would not a sport in order to destroy videotaped evidence of such interrogation if one came today, despite having done so in 2005. if she can't condemn the use of torture, she should not leave the cia. those are some of the papers this morning on that.

in the opinion section of the wall street journal, one more immigration try. this is the editorial from the wall street journal board. fourth this year have deferred the end of the deferred action for childhood arrivals program, but the issue will return soon enough. to 19 republicans, who have signed a discharge petition to debate a fix for the so-called dreamers, which would be an instructive exercise. many republicans want to duck a vote on immigration that divide the party, and there is no urgency since federal courts have ordered the trump administration to renu daca work permits while they consider the legality of the decision to end the program. this is why republicans and can -- are supporting a queen of the hill rule that would set up four immigration votes on the house floor. the bill with the most votes that passes would go to the senate. democrats could offer a bill that only legalizes dreamers. the bipartisan usa act, which pairs order security provisions with legal status, would be debated.

if republicans lose the house, they will have less influence on courts when they rule on daca, and if the courts let daca stand as is, republicans will have --t a bargain jing ship bargaining chip for other priorities. backed thets have queen of the hill resolution, so assuming every democrat side the discharge petition, six more republicans would need to join. this is something that is being debated on capitol hill, and we will have to see what happens if this could come to the floor for a vote. i also want to share with you this story in the wall street journal -- justice officials met with devin nunes, the intelligence chairman, over the republican insistence that they get some documents about the investigations being done in the 2016 campaign and russia connection. the wall street journal reports that the episode was the latest

in an unusual tug-of-war between republican lawmakers and leaders of the justice department, who have long stonewalled for documents related to the politically charged probe. these include investigations of size between the trump campaign association and russian interference in the 2016 election, and if hillary clinton's use of a private email server. gop house members have threatened to hold attorney general jeff sessions and his deputy, rod rosenstein, in contempt of congress if they fail to comply with the requests. we sat down to newsmakers this sunday with mark meadows, one of the republican lawmakers that is pushing the justice department to give them more information about the special counsel's investigation. he is a republican from north carolina and chairs the freedom caucus. the next move, he told us in newsmakers, would be to demand an audit of the scope of the

investigation. take a listen. [video clip] >> there will be a request for us to audit the financial resources of this investigation. it used to be part of statute, it is certainly within the it hasers, since appropriated funds from congress, that we will be sending a request to the general accountability office to actually look at and audit and make sure that those funds are put forth properly. that letter will be going out. >> from the freedom caucus, oversight committee -- >> any member of congress can do that, but i will be doing that in at least my personal capacity, but as you know, i am the chairman of the subcommittee on government operations. are under that subcommittee, and we will be sending that out. >> to audit the spending for the

mueller investigation? >> yeah, because that comes out of a dedicated fund that basically is what we call backdoor appropriations. it might be inside baseball language, but waking sure -- making sure that what we are doing is properly spending that. 3 million plus dollars -- $3 million plus have been spent or potentially not spent in a corrective manner. i'm not making any conclusion to that because i want to back up what we have, but i think we need to look at that a little bit closer as well. host: congressman mark meadows, our guest for newsmakers this week. c-span.org that on .r c-span's radio lab you can also go to our website to watch it there and look at a schedule for an airing of that interview this evening. withto our conversation all of you about mr. trump's

diplomacy efforts, we are getting your thoughts on that this morning. henry in michigan, a democrat. hello, you are on the air. good morning, greta. before i talk about diplomacy, i would like to address the trump caller from california who said he voted for president obama and that nothing got done. no change happen. i would like to remind everyone that under president obama, the economy that was in the tank was saved by president barack obama. he saved the auto industry. he brought jobs back to the united states from a 10% or 11% unemployment rate, trending down to 4% when donald trump took over. so trump now has the pleasure of taking credit for president obama's economy. president obama also gave millions of people who had never had health care before health care.

now trump comes in, destroys and makes it impossible for us to solve the health care problem because he does not have a plan b. i am just so tired of hearing all of these trump people come in and denigrate our president, our great president barack husein obama, who got bin laden -- remember that. he took the bogeyman off the table committed the 9/11 atrocity, but you do not give him credit for that. the media never gave him credit, because the republicans gave the did everything they could to block the economy, so we had an anemic recovery. 1%. that was because of the republicans, not because of barack hussein obama, whose face should be on mount rushmore. now let me talk about diplomacy. host: quickly, henry. caller: our diplomacy right now

is going to cost us five dollars a gallon. we are about to go to war with iran. i want everybody to think about who is going to benefit from this pulling out of the iranian deal? russia, because russia's economy within the tank because gas was at $50 a barrel. now it is going to go upwards of $100 a barrel and we are going to war because israel just attacked iranian assets in syria. so we are about to go to war, and you are talking about peace in north korea? you think kim jong-un is going to give up his nukes? he is going to take trump's word for something? give me a break. you trump people, you white supremacists, -- host: hold on, we will just leave it there. this afternoon, 2:00 p.m. eastern time, is going to be talking about prescription something the

caller started out talking about. he will be in the rose garden for that announcement. 2:00 p.m. eastern time on c-span. you can go to c-span.org or get the free c-span radio app. the caller also mentioned gas prices. usa today has an article about that. gas prices are eating into the tax cuts boost. many say that gap -- the tax cuts giveth and the higher gas prices taketh away. dennis, a republican. good morning. have something to say. especiallydemocrats, that one who just talked, rock hussein obama did not kill obama. a navy seal did. obama took credit for it and so did hillary. but they would not take credit for benghazi. that guy does not know what he

is talking about. i'm a vietnam veteran, did two flew with -- before he was ousted, and flew with ferdinand marcos -- those guys are dictators. all of these democrats that are hating on trump are full of crap. my livelihood in construction was destroyed because of people like mccain. and obama. how come nobody mentions that were chargingina uncle sam $57 an hour to do the --k and bringing in a legal paying eight dollars to $10 an hour. i will not even sponsor my own relatives from mexico because i am an american of mexican descent. all of these people that are so

pro-obama like he was the second coming are full of crap. dennis., another article about foreign policy in usa today. israel prepares for embassy move. groundskeepers planted red, white, and blue flowers underneath american and israeli flags for monday's inauguration of the controversial new location that has sparked palestinian outrage. likely toguests are attend monday's ceremony, including members of congress, and secretary of state john sullivan will lead the delegation, along with a ivanka trump and jared kushner. steven mnuchin and jason greene how -- jason greenblatt will also be in attendance. mike in new york, a democrat. good morning. caller: hi, greta. yes, diplomacy. if obama or hillary clinton ever

cuts this deal with kim, they would say that they got taken to the cleaners. the sky flashed a bomb, threatened everybody -- he was never going to bomb us and he got everything. he got what he wanted now. he is a hero, trump is calling him an excellent guy. if the shoe was on the other foot, they would be beating up on obama or clinton if this happened. this guy also killed that guy, the guy they sent back -- i do not know what they did to him, but he died. is a bigthink this deal at all. let's see what happens in the end. are the people who say why don't we support trump? don't forget what donald trump did when obama was fighting a war, what trump was doing, going after him and calling him illegal, he was not a citizen.

i did not see trump support obama then. and the guy who blamed construction on obama and everything else, illegal aliens come in here because of the chamber of commerce. a republican organization. that is pretty much all i have to say. thank you very much. host: paul, florida, independent. caller: hi, i want to make a small comment. i have been listening to all of these callers who are so angry at president trump. this diplomacy is a great compliment with north korea, and you are president did nothing. previous callers said oh, the economy got big under him. but he spent how many billions of dollars? how many thousands of dollars? [inaudible] and that is what this guy did. host: another note to share with

you, this is an article on usa today and in many of the papers this morning. multiple mistakes led to the fatal attack in niger. the four u.s. soldiers were victims of command mistakes, insufficient training, and ultimately, a surprise attack by well-trained and a better armed force. the pentagon said yesterday in a aboutriefing that lasted one hour. we cover that and you can find it on our website. we will take a short break. when we come back, hudson institute senior fellow michael pregent later on, president trump and congressional republicans are looking to clawback the spending bill congress passed back in march. we will be right back. ♪

>> sunday morning, on 1968, american turmoil, we look at the the war as the back drop of events in 1968, including the vietnam war, the residential campaign, and the space race. and andus our history documentary filmmaker and program director of the project on cold war studies at harvard university. march 1968, american turmoil, live sunday at 8:30 a.m. eastern on c-span's "washington journal" and on american history tv on c-span 3. andunday night, journalist author's jerome corsi talks

about his book. >> i heard some of these phrases dented about the past couple of years and i did not attach a lot of meaning to them until more recently. maybe you can define in your view the deep stage, shadow government and the swap -- are they the same thing or how do you differentiate between them? >> in my opinion, it's the deep state. others call it the shadow government because it is affecting their own bureaucratic wishes rather than the wishes of the people, in electing donald trump, for instance. donald trump has termed it the swap, which is the term that most americans immediately understand because washington was at one point a swap -- a swap. -- aswamp. on sunday at 9:00 p.m.

on c-span's book tv. >> washington journal continues. at our table this morning, michael, you were supposed to be joined by the president of the iranian-american council. he cannot be here today. but thank you for joining us at the table for this discussion. what do you think about the president's decision to withdraw from the iran aerial? guest: i personally think it was the right decision for a number of britain's. just.ent macron said it if there were no changes to today's iran deal, there would korea,clear armed north because of the sunset clauses and the ballistic missiles.

we had iran violating existing agreements.ncil iran gave the president a lot of arguments outside of the nuclear deal to make the argument that the nuclear donated to go away because it was fueling -- nuclear deal to go away because it was fueling all of this other activity. they created new militias, working with the who tease -- the huthies. it gave the president the ammunition to go after it. without them, the iranian deal would still be in place. host: are you saying that the iranians were still complying with the nuclear deal? guest: i worked in the special access program where analysts looked at intel and it was

highly compartmentalize. know there's intel there. i know it is highly contained. it goes to an audience. that's why you have pompeo say that iran is cheating. we were not able to verify whether iran was complying with developing trigger systems, computer models on headed detonate a nuclear weapon. we had no way of verifying if they were income science than waste -- in compliance. then we see this other activity. there were four additional military sites that were not part of the jcpoa.

they did not want to go out and investigate. they did not want to be a political arm of the president. they were cheating. if they are cheating out in the open on ballistic missiles, and they are cheating when these commercial aircraft to debt -- --iland in damascus commercial aircraft to land in damascus, why would they be in the shadows? host: the supreme leader of iran -- sydney, present or honey -- theident rouhani said united states can leave. we hope to continue the iran new year deal at the other countries. guest: literally two hours

later, you see that certain to crumble. lose $36tands to billion if the president canceled the iran deal, in contracts. the motive for european countries to stay in his economic. they want to do business with this economy. but when they initially started these contracts, the iranian 3000 to one u.s. dollar. it is now 8000 to one u.s. dollar. it makes the contracts with iran that much weaker. russia and china want to stay in because they are guaranteed oil and military contracts. but again, iran cannot now afford to buy the military equipment. and now it's sanctions going back on its oil, it will make it more difficult for russia and china to benefit. the argument, from the united are we inspective,

the a deal for security reasons or economic reasons? again, the argument, if the united states walks away, we lose europe, this does not add up. this is the economy the size of maryland. they will pick the united states. guest: they guess -- host: they guess that was supposed to be here credits the obama administration. leaders. of business they did not want business leaders to put pressure on iran to come to the table because they did not wanted seen in those terms. were behind the scenes trying to put the boeing deal in place. a pack that supported the iran

deal had a lot of money coming into it that stood to benefit from a boeing deal based on the putting at --t putting pressure on the obama administration. the iran deal being sold as a great -- not only in arms control deal, but also a way to get economic investment in, the theign minister zarif makes argument that the u.s. has been in breach of the iran deal since the beginning because we have failed to encourage european investment in iran. that is his main complaint. the united states is not asking europe to invest in iran. that is the key to the whole iran deal. now that we are -- again, europe was afraid to go in to the iran deal because of u.s. secondary sanctions. they are key because the islamic

revolution regard corps -- revolutionary guard corps. irgc backed out of the economic sanctions on the domestic front and the economy, again, the rgc budget tripled. the iranian protesters complain squandered the benefits of the jcpoa. we would still have an iran deal. they have been using this money, you are arguing, for a proxy war in yemen, in syria against israel, without the iran deal in place, is there a risk

that the united states gets dragged into these proxy wars? guest: i have been hearing what russia is saying about this you had european countries yesterday condemning iran's 20-missile barrage on israel. urging both sides to stop. but there was a message. this will not be tolerated. we cannot back you up, iran, if you do things like this that you prove the president's point. you lose us as well. and china if you race to a bomb. the iranian economy is not worth it to these two countries. the messages were key. strikes against proxies and advisers. they're the only military that has hit another military.

we had proxies from russia, from iran, from iraq. israel is hitting military advisers on the ground. netanyahu was there. that sent a strong message to iran. iran is more isolated now. they are becoming very broke. if you look at what the protesters are saying, iran has five dollars. when they see ballistic missiles and ventures him everywhere and the u.s. pulling out of the iran deal, it is hurting -- and them everywhere u.s. pulling out of the iran deal, it is hurting the a ringing people. the two friends they have are

russia and china. they are both saying, hey, you have to slow this israel stuff down. you cannot do this. and we are not likely to see russia support. and by not taking sides, israel will have the advantage in syria. what does hezbollah do with all those rockets? host: us take a call. . thank you for taking my call. are proudt to say we to be americans, but we have to look at what is right and what is wrong. we cannot tell me that all the allies that support this deal that we have the more right to just go on and get out of the deal. i just think the donald trump,

when he mentioned that he doesn't do taxes and he doesn't do this, the guy is really reckless. i think that he lost of the moral righteousness to try to tell other nations how to lead because if all our allies are in accord that this is the best deal we could do not to get out of it and we look at it now, what is he going to do in north korea that will be better than the iran deal? to me, it is like we are beating the drum of war and we are really acting out of -- to me, it's crazy. guest: the other argument is -- nice for the question -- the other argument is this hurts us with north korea, walking away from the iran deal. how can we trust the united

states if they don't keep their word? this was a treaty we would never have been able to walk away. it would have been ratified by congress with 60 votes in the senate. when i say we, i mean those of us in the -- close to the iran deal. it helps us with north korea. kim jong-un stepped up with his rocket attacks and his nuclear program under the last year of the obama administration, hoping to get an iran-like deal with weak enforcement. we now know that he is not going to get that. he thinks it just happened in the last 24 hours. it undermines the entire argument. secretary pompeo returned with three americans from north korea. the forest sitting down with kim jong-un on the nuclear program. if you contrast -- he forced sitting down with kim jong-un on the nuclear program. that with thet obama administration. two iran, it was everything.

iran, it was everything. it absolutely helps us with north korea. states was the only country worried about security, the security issue of the iran deal. military in it for contracts and the oil deal. president macri said, if there were no changes, they would be north korea. requires russia and china to agree to that and they were not going to. host: do you see oil prices rising? guest: yes. host: what are the politics of oil prices rising, given the you just said that russia is in this for oil? plans toudi arabia compensate. of up is good for a a lot

economies, including russia's, to include other countries that are not in the u.s. orbit. it is an opportunity to see what the next two weeks to 30 days looks like as oil starts to go down because saudi arabia is compensating for the loss of iranian exports. and also iraq will do the same thing. iraq will push out. one of the major concerns i have is that iran starts using iraq as a shell company to offset u.s. sanctions. against him of the reason you are -- european countries won't with them, the rgc is already using it. was interviewed in the "new york times" piece. the fata party is active militia

times" to "the new york is called them former militia members here in iran has best members. iran has access to u.s. training. they have been warned that any attack against us, there will be retribution, consequences for tehran and baghdad. it is an interesting middle east because iran sees iraq and syria as one battlefield. -- iraq iran and syria and syria as one battlefield. those strategic messages come -- there are five different once the contradict each other. host: i want to go back to what you said about saudi arabia flooding the market when they struck a deal with russia in march to cut back on oil production.

guest: this changes that. killing the iran deal changes that. russia and china will see to offset the losses coming out of the iranian market by doing that. new deals. i think iran is becoming less and less important to russia. china is bankrolling everything. china has been pouring money into iran to compensate for lack of european investment. it's a sinking ship. it is a bottomless pit. and the president had a strong message. any country trying to get iran to a nuclear weapon will also be sanctioned. these talking about russia and china. he wasn't talking about our european allies. iran's economy is not worth the political and economic pitfalls that will come if they continue to support this regime. host: winter haven, florida, republican. caller: sir, i agree with you 100%.

obama just wanted to give them money for nothing. up tody has got to stand these people that vowed to kill us and -- and have no respect for humanity whatsoever. that's all i have to say. have a good day. host: let's talk about the money. up $150ident brings billion and $1.8 billion. the letter fact says the first act says- politicaf the first number is dodgy and the second is incorrect. guest: the argument is that it was their money to begin with. the $150 billion. the second amount was interest on a $400 million military contract prior to the regime

shahwing, prior to the falling. the controversy with the second part was that it was used to exchange for hostages. the president said i really want to know what it looked like. ask greg mcgurk. the money is always been an issue. it never went back to the iranian people. when you hear the protesters, they tout that. they say the $100 billion never came back to us. even ahmadinejad, someone we always worried about as a hardliner and death to america that, said the supreme leaders ts is this so company conglomerate worth $90 million that was delisted. it had nothing to do with the

nuclear program, but it was something we gave the regime in order for them to sign it. that feels all this terrorism. -- off myigital dinner jed -- after dinner jed -- you just cannot make this stuff up. caller: you guys are stealing my questions and answers. , if you are on the right side, you are saying that we gave iran $150 billion. if you are on the left side -- not partisan. before obama, everybody was against the regime. caller: but if you're someone on the left side, everyone says iran sold oil to north korea,

south korea, china, and then the sanctions were imposed. money and was their when the sanctions were lifted, we gave them their money back, and then the cash that was brought there was just to get them started before all the money was freed up back to them. sayingwhat you are because i have been looking for to having somebody talk about this. i'm still a little confused on what are- so it host: you confused about? others might be confused as well. i'm confused that the president, when he was in iowa saying whyis, he was did obama give them $150 billion? i would never give anybody $150 billion. but i believe it was their money

and we just give it back to them. guest: yes, but the reason we seized that money to begin with was because it was fueling terrorism and has the law and building ballistic missiles. it was paying for a weaponize nuclear program. it was their money. when president trump was running in the campaign, he was against the iran deal. he said this is a bad deal because we didn't make any money off it. a former political operative and we did and at. a bad deal wasn't because we are not making money off it, but because iran is a bad deal.

caller: i have a question for your guest. i support our president 100 are sent, other than -- 100 percent, other than his ego or when he insults people. i support him. i will vote for him again. i will play devil's advocate. led by donald wilber in wrote an article. debt was hired by the iranian people to straighten contract,troleum which was only given iran -- giving iran 3% of the oil profits. he was democratically elected

and our deep state at the time decided it was more beneficial to the u.s. to put a dictator in aree to help bp and maybe military-industrial complex. so while i love my country and i think my country is the freest country in the world, i think some of these clandestine operations by our intelligence community need to go. we need to ask americans listening now, think if we would not have done that, as i understand it, iran was our biggest ally from world war i through world war ii. there was no better ally in the middle east. their culture is actually closest to america's culture other than israel now in the entire region. so i'm asking your guest, what is your opinion on how our cia actually blew it and created this scenario we are in now? big fan of not a time travel questions.

i cannot go back in time and address what happened in 1952. i am not try to diminish what you are saying, but let's look at the current situation. rest assured that our current clandestine service cannot do that anymore because we put it executive orders under three presidents take you from doing that. a look at what israel was able to do because they do have that network, they do have a clandestine network that works with the irgc to get that stuff out. so there are schisms within the iranian revolution -- revolutionary guard corps. everything you are asking is right. but we just don't do that. we can't go back 10 years and ink what right looked like iraq with the surge because we did not do those things in that campaign to defeat isis. we don't look at our history. we recycle things. that is why we have these

problems. solutions with permanent ramifications. caller: thank you for taking my call. one issue with your guests's comments, if this had been a treaty, we would still be in a treaty. we walked away from the abm treaty 17 years ago, whenever, without having an action on that. treaties usually have pretty good escape clauses that allow executive action. guest: and russia was cheating. that's why we walked away. and everybody agreed to it. you didn't have america -- democrats saying they want cheating. you did not have republicans saying they want cheating. so the -- they were not cheating. caller: the simplistic argument that europe is only in the jcpoa , theyfor economic reasons

are much closer to the middle east than we are. they are vulnerable to destabilizing activities than we are. we see this in syria with the migration issue. i ask that you take a bit more of a nuanced view of what european security interests are. and my third point here, my third question, are you at all concerned about the united states giving israel a blank check to basically do as it pleases with iran? maybe we are not there yet, but are you willing to go on the record that the u.s. should allow itself to be drawn into a ar on israel's behalf? caller: the united states -- guest: the united states already is. refugeenot see the exodus that we saw in 2015, 2016, 2017. the refugee flow is a direct

iran. of an emboldened turkey used it to leverage their position. i absolutely believe that israel should be able to defend itself in southern syria, especially when iran is increasing its capabilities there. they are not there to fight isis or anybody else. they are there to target israel. they are not using rockets and missiles to hit isis. they are being his vision to hit israel. israel has every right to do it -- they are being positioned to hit israel. israel has every right to do it. you get one because your enemies are already there. iran already believes they are at war with israel. israel believes it is already at war with iran. there are definitely iranian positions in syria. russia sat on its hands because what israel hit was not there to

fight isis. they were there to threaten israel. russia sat on its hands and israel's set back three years of ink in the rgc yesterday taking out those missile factories, those missile positions, and those leaders. we support that. if you designate the rgc as a terrorist organization, you should be able to change the a f and allow the united states and israel to target militia leaders in syria when they threaten u.s. bases and when they launch rockets against israel. host: if they do not, if they remain, what is the danger of iran remaining in syria for years to come? they have a foothold. they have propped up assad. you had americans

preventing in the logistical support. syria was not in a place where iran could go any do these things. that has changed. --n can freely move through -- move mious through ilitias through. iran is no longer insulated by the jcpoa. it was going to be allowed to become a conventional military power. at the end of the sunset clause, a nuclear weapon on top of a ballistic missile that had already been perfected, had the conventional force to deter a u.s. or israeli strike on iran's nuclear facilities, and now have european investment entrenched in iran to the point where there would be not much we could do about it and we would have to say iran is the new power broker

in the middle east and they are doing it through force and economic leverage. that.hanges all of it makes the middle east a much safer place then it would have if iran was allowed to continue in this iran deal. it might take a former intelligence officer that looks at threats and motives and patterns and metrics and analysis. host: ralph, democrat. caller: good morning. please allow your guest to answer the following question. i'm sick and tired of guests coming on blaming president obama for everything and saying he did nothing and he had no support. drop, --dent now, only one is the [indiscernible] agreement, of this

gas prices at the pump are going up. who are going to suffer? the american people. the iranian people. because afford to go [indiscernible] one other thing i would like to , we are the ones that will have our lead, -- our blood, tears, going somewhere else to fight for somebody else. here, are sick and tired of all of these wars and we get involved in things and we have no reason to get involved in. let me hear what you have to say about that. guest: thank you for your question, sir. i praised president obama when he started attacking isis in iraq and syria.

fact-based.y i don't want to be partisan. . on the iran go, i was ok with the nuclear side of it. i was not ok with the nonnuclear concessions. by three wars, desert storm, i served in iraq for four or five years. i'm trying to keep 10-year-old americans from fighting in iraq again as 20 euros because that is what is going to have -- 20-year-olds because that is what is going to happen. we tell our enemy when we are going to leave. that's why we have been in afghanistan for 17 euros. -- 17 years. since we are in washington dc, we use this analysis -- analogy. you cannot tell your enemy what you are going to do. iran will draw us into the next war.

they would have done it with the jcpoa. they are try to do it now outside of the jcpoa. they are weaker now. they will that become a conventional military. they are setting friends by the hour. this -- this is a better position. there has been no counter strike from iran against israel. what happened yesterday in syria is israel took away offensive capabilities from the iranians and the russians sat on their hands. the russians don't want a war. we don't want a war. iran does. they needed to remain viable. . at -- they need it to remain viable and they are likely to continue for the next 10 years. russia cannot replace an aircraft if we shoot it. down they cannot replace their it down.oot they cannot replace their men.

they are there to protect russia. if they launch those rockets to fend off that cruise missile would deplete- it all of their rockets and missiles and leave themselves vulnerable for 40 minutes. we don't want to escalate. russia is sending a powerful message to iran. we will not take sides. by not taking sides, they took israel's side. caller: good morning. question or a comment? caller: i have a question and a comment. you have all been talking about what i was going to talk about. i did want to mention one thing about the 17 years in afghanistan. i grew up during the vietnam war.

back then, it was common law which -- common knowledge that the cia was smuggling heroin out of the golden triangle. deal, withhe iran the arab spring, what that brought us was a massacre of the middle class of northern africa. i never heard congress declare war on libya. and anything that was part and parcel of that whole arrangement, which the iran deal was, to perpetrate these complexes, i think the guest is right. that is what the cia does. the perpetrate conflicts because they make money on that. guest: i don't remember saying that. host: the viewer. guest: yeah, the viewer said that. i never said that. caller: we have in in wars continuously since world war ii. you go back all that way.

saw theion is i never cia listed in the constitution or the f ei or these wrote -- the fbi or these rogue agencies that have their own agenda. i think it is time to rein these things back in. like kennedy wanted to do after the bay of pigs. he wanted to disband the cia. ok, got your point. guest: i think our professionals inside the intelligence community are focused on security threats. i think we have gotten away from what the viewer mentioned. we are not doing those things anymore. people learn from the mistakes. place.s but rules in our intelligence community is continued to focus on isis and

nuclear proliferation. this guy keeps talking about the intelligence community. toldntelligence community us about weapons of mass he keption in iraq -- talking about [indiscernible] which is untrue. host: i'm going to leave it there because it is running out of time. guest: it has made the intelligence committee from making recommendations. say, sir, be able to it is a slamdunk, they have a nuclear row graham -- nuclear program. the nsa believes everything they hear on the phone if the other side does not know the they are being listened to. we lie on the phone all the

time. we believe government officials when they tell us nothing is happening in the country's. that is an american talking to a foreign official. in theeach cell intelligence community is someone who knows what is happening and i think leaders need to know who is crossing their arms in meetings in dissenting opinions. people predicted isis was on the the view in the ic was that there wasn't. maybe it is a deception program. it is a detente, a deception program met to fend off -- meant to fend off iran. host: thank you for being here. lines. open up the phone any public policy or political

about.e can talk then we will talk about the spending bill. we will be right back. ♪ connect with c-span to personalize the information you get from us. just go to c-span.org/connect and sign up for the email. the upgram guide is to the moment primetime schedule. word for word has a daily video highlights with no commentary. the book tv newsletter sent weekly is an insiders look at upcoming authors and professionals. and the american history tv newsletter gives you the upcoming programming exploring our nation's past. c-span.org/connect and sign up today.

monday, on landmark cases, regents of the university of california v baki. claimed he was passed over in favor of less qualified minority applicants and took the university of california system to court. the resulting supreme court decision struck down the university specific admissions program and upheld affirmative action. as acting u.s.ed solicitor general in the obama administration from 2010 to 2011. randy barnett at georgetown law center, a libertarian and no originalist constitutional legal scholar. join the conversation. follow us at c-span.

and we have resources on our website for background information. >> washington journal continues. host: we are in open phones here until that :00 a.m. eastern time on "washington journal." a.m. eastern time on "washington journal." is the first time you don't have any independent views or independent, to have.

on my the have -- on my behalf, i have been listening to a lot of viewers and the people are right. if it was not for the people, then the people would not have a voice. just like a lot of things in history that have been dealt because of the people's voice. it wasn't because of the government or trump or anything else. at to the iran nuclear deal, lot of people forgot how history has grown between u.s. relations and the middle east relations, that we have never had a good relationship between them anyways. i don't really think it is a good idea to even have nuclear war or have nuclear material sent to them. that's crazy.

economic power. they have no main form of government. why should we give them nuclear material just to blow up somebody else or harm our country? i'm just some u.s. citizen that just thanks or everybody thinks i'm crazy. host: richard in north carolina, republican. caller: i would like to ask a question. how come we don't hear anything, not one word about the killings going on -- please don't hang up on me. host: we are listening, richard. caller: how come we don't hear one word about what is going on, the killings in gaza? not one word. do you think we don't know what is going on there? we have the ability to listen to other media, international

media, and the israelis are shooting people with explosive bullets on people. why none of you guys will mention it? richard, we go through the papers and try to mention as much as we can. obviously, there are other stories out there. you can call in and bring up the servers just like you did. we go to paul in new fairfield, connecticut, independent. caller: good morning. thanks for c-span. my call concerns president trump and his diplomatic efforts from your last segment. efforts are basically trying to deflect from the

waters that are rising around him. he is trying to make it seem as his is indispensable problems increase. theink that is what strategy is, for them to say, well, look at all the good work he's doing as all of the scandals surrounding him. host: ok. new fairfield, connecticut. "the washington post has this headline. so there's that calling capitol hill. there is this story in politico.

paul ryan says may 17 is the deadline to assure a nafta vote. the top trade officials from all three nations have been meeting all week in washington to work on a revised the deal, knowing that time was running short to get a deal through congress in this legislative session. ryan's comments only as pressure. there is also this story about paul ryan in "the washington post" about immigration. that paul ryan aims to limit a vote on immigration. there is an effort by moderate republicans to push for a vote, force votes on immigration to deal with so-called dreamers. that editorial in the "wall street journal" this morning. one more immigration tried. many republicans want a duck a

vote. -- a daca vote. the issue of what to do with the i -- 800,000 young adults brought to the u.s. as children, many of them have no memory of their home country. they are not going away. amocrats will use them as puzzle against republicans in the fall. the bill is riddled with poison pills.

196 democrats have backed the queen of the hill resolution. democrat signs the petition, six more republicans would have to join. a vigorous floor debate would a democrat majority. steve, what is on your mind this morning? caller: you read an article earlier about john mccain. i respect john mccain. he went through a lot with his service for our country when he was in the military. saying now that he cannot support jena haskell because she won't denounce

torture. when mr. brennan was going through confirmation to be the cia director, he flat out said that he supported waterboarding and enhance interrogation. host: are you sure about that? i think the distinction people making is that brennan did say it wasn't moral when he was testifying. caller: he still supported it, the use of it, to get information to keep america safe. if you are going to take one word and use that one word to say,yes, to the person and no, they can't, if we are getting down to one word, we will not have anybody. he's being hypocritical here. saidcked one person that they agreed with using waterboarding, but he won't back a person when they say they will follow the law.

host: i hear your point, buying courage you and others to go to c-span.org. go into our video library and watch for yourself what brennan said when he testified to be the cia director for the obama administration. that is the beauty of the video library. c-span is there for the entire hearing, from gavel to gavel, when we cover these hearings on capitol hill. you can go back and look at the video yourself and let us know what you think. i encourage everybody, go to c-span.org. if you missed june a haskell's testimony, you can also find it there. testimony, you's can also find it there. here is a story on "the hill." a white house official calls meghan mccain to apologize.

in the bronx, a democrat, good morning. caller: thank you. this is my first time. host: yes, we are listening to you. caller: this is my first time ever calling c-span for the 30 years i have been in america. i'm grateful. i want to address what this guy said a few minutes ago. he said it was wrong to use it.

let me give you a number. let's not give out phone numbers and addresses. caller: i want him to call me so i can debate him. he was a liar. he must have his facts right. host: now you call up and tell us what you think. caller: it is wrong for us to engage in that. what the white house aide said, oh, he is just dying, it is completely wrong. that is how the president speaks and that is how he talks. the fruit does not fall far from the apple. it is a disgrace. and to your last caller who thinks that is good for the president to pull out of the iran can do what

it wants with the support of the european nations. it is an invitation to war in the middle east. that's all i want to say. thank you very much. i hope the american people are listening. you don't want to give out your phone number. you don't know who else will call you. minnesota, independent. caller: good morning. i would like to say a couple of things. we are worrying too much about the war. -- about the washington, which we really cannot change. my main issues are over here in minnesota. yesterday, the minneapolis tribune had an

article about hunger in america. no one should have hunger in america. number two is our school systems. minneapolis, st. paul, $15 million in the hole. that is what america should be focusing on, our local issues, not this issue overseas. that is another department. our military should not have a thousand bases all over the america toder for succeed and still be a -- and still be america. take care of our people, our kids, our health. that is how we are going to succeed. that is all i want to say, thank you. i wanted to say something about haskell.

we had the nuernberg trials. we should be concerned with human rights. i find it terrible that the united states has to answer for torture in front of the whole world. that is a shame. host: iowa, democrat, open phones. ,aller: i would like to discuss in this state, which is a republican state, we have had the military style ice raids. they pick the people up and they disappear. lawyers don't know where they are at. the local sheriff's do not know where they are taking them. and i believe that the idea that responsibility to the local sheriff, who was the

elected law enforcement, can just take people off the street and from there were based with nobodyic input, with having anything to say about how that people are treated. i'm worried that we have concentration camps for the immigrants in this country and nobody talks about it. nobody looks for them. that you can be picked up off the street and whisked away is just like russia, as far as i'm concerned. host: we are in open phones. you can call about to policy issues, political as well. we are six months away from the 2018 midterm election. pennsylvania,m announced earlier this year that

he will not seek reelection. he decided he will just resign from congress effective this saturday. he was on the floor yesterday. here is part of his farewell speech. and here is part of his farewell speech. [video clip] >> as a senior member of the appropriations committee, i fought to keep the government-funded and prevent default our nation's obligations. at times, that has not been easy. -- mymany of us know friend is here, and unfortunately, due to disruptive political influences, increased has led to congress becoming more paralyzed and unable to perform even our most basic and fundamental tasks. phenomenon manifested itself most clearly during the 2013 enteral government shutdown, but it continues today.

this political polarization has led to a disturbing trend where fringe elements of both the far right and far left are emboldened and empowered, and while the bases of both political parties are well represented in congress, the governing center has been under increased pressure. expecty republicans unquestioning blind unquestioning loyalty and obedience to president trump, no matter how absurd or disruptive the commodore behavior. constitutional separation of the powers is almost an alien concept after religiously demanding congress assert its article one powers during the obama years. on the other side, far too many democrats offer unflinching resistance in opposition to president trump, even if they agree with him on a given policy were position. partieson of political has replaced separation of powers as a guiding governing philosophy.

is notnamic simply sustainable and it is already having trouble he -- troubling consequences. is --charlie dench who charlie dent who is resigning effectively this saturday. you can see his speech on c-span.org. montrose, and independent. i called about daca, i think they should just do a clean bill and let those children out of their misery. let them know they are here to stay. but i was listening to the gentleman that just retired or there are so many like him, like jeff flake, so many really good legislators that are leaving under this administration and that makes me very sad for our democracy. patricia, there have been

a slew of republicans that have decided to resign rather than running for reelection, raising hopes for democrats that they might be able to take those seats and possibly win back the house and the senate. six months to go, roll call has the most vulnerable list out and these are the top 10 vulnerable senators in the midterm elections. heller of with dean nevada who no longer faces the primary threat but use the only republican up for reelection in a state hillary clinton won. that's a tricky place to be. the democrats odds of living if you gop seats have increased over the past six months, but this list like the one we did a year out from election day ranks incumbents most likely to lose, not seats most likely the flip. heidi heitkamp in west virginia, and joe manchin have traded places with heidi heitkamp at fourth and mansion at fifth.

democrats would have inhabited faced on lincoln ship that they are not getting representative evan jenkins who they spent nearly $2 million against in the primary. the biggest changes in florida, senator bill nelson moving up from eight to six with governor rick scott entering into the race pushing montana senator jon tester and sherrod brown down to seventh and eighth respectively. this list is compiled after a consultation with strategists on both sides of the aisle and inside elections with nathan gonzales. is the only public enough for reelection in a state that hillary carried. dannyial candidate tankard and is running for the house at trump surging. the top 10 vulnerable house incumbents, rolled all -- roll call it together that list. public and skill of the list with the gop on defense in a difficult national environments, the 10 most honorable incumbents

six months out are all republicans. the biggest change from when we last compiled a list here out, most vulnerable member, darrell roz bloomtiring and goes into the top spot. barbara comstock moves of the and california representative steve knight make the cut this time in part because of the difficulty of holding a district, all of which hillary clinton carried. keith rothfus makes his debut here thanks to redistricting. you can read more at rollcall.com. robert in oregon, a republican. good morning. what's on your mind? caller: good morning. i'm recalling -- i'm calling in and -- to john mccain the hassle confirmation. mccain has been a flip flopper his entire career, he could've

and hetake care of daca voted against obamacare when he was running for reelection and then when the same bill came back he voted against it. brennan has supported the nomination for the cia director wholeheartedly. that --t incredible mccain is two-faced about this and then finally, obviously, has been a spat between him and donald trump, but the steele dossier, he knew exactly what he was doing when he did that. obstructionistn and i'm sorry that he's dying, i understand what all goes with that. host: robert, we will leave it there.

and oregon republican. we will take a short break and when we come back, we talk about the rescission packages which and russellresident republicans to try and cut parts of that massive $1.3 trillion spending bill. super about david how they can do this. we will be right back. ♪ >> c-span, where history unfolds daily. in 1979, c-span was created as a public service by america's cable television companies. and today, we continue to bring you unfiltered coverage of congress. the white house. the supreme court. and public policy events in washington, d.c. and around the country.

c-span is brought to you by your cable or satellite provider. >> sunday on "q&a," university of california santa barbara on his bookessor "inseparable," about the life and times of conjoined twins. >> you can imagine, these are two married couples that cannot also,the same bed and when they set up these two separate households about a mile they stickther and to this very rigid schedule that they will stay and live in one house for three days with his wife and then during these three he is the master of his

house and can do whatever he wants to. and he will give up his free will. that's called alternate mastery. move ands later, they then the other will be the master of the house and the other gives up his own free will. >> didn't work? -- did it work? >> apparently, they had 21 children. >> "washington journal," continues. in talkinge back this morning about republicans efforts and the president's efforts to cut spending from that $1 trillion omnibus package that was passed earlier this year. us, she's as joins better order with politico. once on the trump administration's $15 billion cost-cutting list, so what is on this? what are the takeaways? guest: we have on this list

about one third of the cutbacks that come from the department of energy programs. that's a pretty big deal and there are some inherent, some of these programs that have been repeatedly on the chopping block , it's money that hasn't been used in a while, leaders in congress and always in looking at it to use as offset further legislation that includes a asan energy loan program well as a loan program that goes towards advanced technology for vehicles in both of those have been frequent targets of spending bills in the past. it's unclear right now the white house is going to have the support to go ahead with those. about half of the money that comes from this cutback is from the children's health insurance program, which on its head doesn't sound that great, the republicans going after this low income health program for kids, but on the face of it, and the nonpartisan congressional budget office has confirmed that

actually none of the funding that will be taken away here actually impacts the program. this is just much authority, not money that would actually be spent and a lot of it has been expired. those are really the big key takeaways from the white house package. host: steny hoyer from maryland said this -- not a medical -- a nickel from defense. if you're going to rescind money for nonuse, the logic is the want to cut nondefense discretionary spending whatever it is and we are obviously opposed to that is the focus. there's nothing coming from the defense department on this. there are 10 departments that are impacted and none of them are the pentagon. that's because the president has made a priority to give the pentagon pretty much anything asks for this year. it would have been surprising if they were to say we are going to be coming back after those programs now.

there's a lot of noncontroversial cuts in this package out of the $15 billion, only about $3 billion amount to real cuts and that basically means most of this money has either been expired or congress has no plan on using it, but there are some programs that are facing some resistance from members, even republicans on capitol hill who say they aren't ready to bury these programs. they want to see them exist and they do they want to have a second chance. there are a couple of members of the appropriations committee that are starting to raise some alarms. host: what is the likelihood that these rescission packages passed the house and the senate and this is the only one we will see from the white house? guest: this is definitely not feel when we will see from the white house. we have mick mulvaney very anxious to give sending out more requests to capitol hill. the one they are starting with is the least controversial than they could come up with.

a lot of these cutbacks wouldn't actually impacts the program. ist they are trying to do talk to democrats into supporting something that came from president trump. democrats as we heard steny hoyer is saying we are not going to go ahead with this idea, but in reality this is something that both parties have agreed to in the past, last under president george w. bush. its prospectsge, in the house are pretty good. there are a couple of republican appropriators making noise, but on the whole, i think you are going to see the vast majority of republicans and sign on to this, particularly after the cbo report basically gave them permission to do this, they say there are no cuts going to be impacted. in the senate, it's up in the air. we don't know right now if there is not a single democrat supporting this, which i wouldn't expect given the funds, we willip to see majority leader mitch mcconnell really do some arm-twisting to get everyone of his members on board.

we are not expecting to have arizona senator john mccain back on capitol hill anytime soon, that means they really can't lose a single republican vote if they are planning to pass this. opportunity that the trip administration doesn't have that option, because this only requires 51 votes, it does not -- it is not subject to the filibuster like every other spending bill that congress passes. host: what about appropriations chairs? are lawmakers that share the appropriations committee and they are in charge of where the money goes. what did they say? guest: one of my colleagues spoke to richard shelby, the new chair of senate appropriations committee yesterday and he said he is concerned about cuts to the appalachian development highway system, the white house had $45 billion of cuts to the program, a pretty sizable amounts and he says his stated alabama has benefited from that over the years and he is not sure if he is ready to let that go. he is going to see if the bill

changes at all for his the senate. meanwhile in the house, ronnie has sold reporters he is looking over it and he hasn't exactly been a robust supporter of this idea, but that said, it definitely could be something he supports because it does not target the most recent omnibus. he told reporters in the past he's not willing to board package that would seem to be going back on a deal with democrats. that kind of package that does go after that $1.3 trillion spending bill is likely to be the next package of decision cuts we see from the white house in a couple of weeks. thank youh ferris for that. david suber, law professor with you -- torsion university, let's talk about how this gets done. what is a rescission? guest: it's a proposal president makes the congress to cancel

money that's already been appropriated. there's a special law that governs these things that allows it to go through a very fast process as your reporter mentioned, is not subject to a filibuster and generally can't a bottled up in committee. this is a way of getting a fast decision on proposals to cut back on funding. host: what gives the president the power to do this? it comes from the incumbent control act that was passed in 1974 to resolve disputes between president x and and -- nixon in congress. if the president things that shouldn't be spent, the president can ask congress to pull it back through this expedited procedure. host: why does congress need to approve it? guest: congress already passed laws that make this money in the president

signed those appropriation laws and if we're going to change laws, we need to pass a new law. host: what happened that the impoundment control act was needed? refusedresident nixon to spend money on domestic programs he didn't like, the women infants and children program providing food for pregnant women and small children, president next and -- nixon refuse to spend the money and there was a lot of pushing back and forth. they decided they needed to be a better way to resolve this stuff. explain the difference between the president resending requests of funds that have been appropriated but not yet obligated. money,when you spend there are several steps involved. the first and most important is where congress passes a law appropriating the money.

but after that, money gets committed to outside parties. it gets committed to a contract to provide this or social security recipients who is due for their monthly check, it gets committed to a state under a formula and wants that money is formal word is obligated, then the money is not available for rescission. host: is it always discretionary, not mandatory? guest: yes. this is very clear. mandatory money is committed as soon as congress passes the statute setting out the rights. there is no social security money that is appropriated but not committed. what do you think about congress passing the omnibus trillion dollar and then bending -- coming back with precision

cuts -- rescission cuts. democrats, call (202) 748-8000, republicans, call independents1, and (202) 748-8003. can congress make its own rescission cuts? guest: congress can pull back money, but the expedition from thes come back residence. congress can't add to the list but they can subtract from it or refuse to pass it. mccarthy's the majority leader in the house for republicans and they had this to say. about thes are not omnibus, it's about saving money. they did it without 11 times. 600 times.osed

it's a way to save money. guest: they say it won't affect programs because it won't otherwise be spent. is not spending money by resending it. they will reduce operations in various programs that matter. something that is without a cost. some programs are not important or not justified or not worth the money and we should have the debate on the merits on those programs lower than pretending it doesn't have an impact. host: susan in pennsylvania, democrat. caller: what i want to say is in regard to the big tax cuts that noworations have received, they want to take any extra money that might be available native forthat are

the american people how i think the whole trump administration has to be carefully watched because little by little, they are going to give all the extra to the corporations, the wealthy, and take it away from the people that need it very -- need it. arguing welicans are are saving money and this money is not going to be spent, it's wasteful and unnecessary. how do they define that? guest: there is no clear criteria and all the talk about how the money isn't going to be spent suggests there's not a willingness to set criteria to say what we want. if you are taking back money that's not going to be spent, you are not going to save anything. the number of these are taking back money and i think they are using a few high-profile rescissions of money that is not going to be spent to suggest that the whole package is nothing and that's not the case. host: arlington heights, illinois, steve is a democrat.

steve, good morning. caller: hello. i'm a social security recipients if, throughering his omnibus package, which they will never, ever pay for, i'm ,ondering if there's a chance because social security and medicare and the like. therisk -- guest: rescission package does not do that and by law, they could not affect social security or school lunches or say. repeated calls for entitlement reform, which means cutting entitlement programs and there are really only three entitlement programs that are really large reagan save the kind of money that was spent on

the tax bill last fall. social security, medicaid. anything else with small change. we bust the budget as badly as the tax will did, inevitably, people are going to come up for those programs. host: on "newsmakers," republican freedom caucus chair mark meadows is our guest and he was asked we sat down with him about this ever to rescind funds. [video clip] >> it has a chance come up were watching, i didn't even follow it and i was a member of congress. times, it uses those unspent, obligated funds that are left over. it's hard to believe that there was $15.4 billion left over, but there was actually more than that. as they start to focus in on that, i do believe is enough support in the house to do it.

there is some some conservative members who say it's a lot more than that. i would love to have it up there in the $50 million, $60 billion market i talked to director mulvaney a number of times about and iscission package talked to leo mccarthy, who is leading the effort in the house and i think at the end of the asked atre seeing this one of several processes that maybe multiple rescission packages that come over time. >> is that what director mulvaney has relayed to you? guest: yes. >> with any outside the scope of the budget? >> right now, this rescission package was definitely tailored to say ok, you have four people making an agreement on appropriations and so the rescission package was not designed to touch any of the $1.3 trillion. heirsour "newsmakers,"

6:00 a.m. eastern, go to c-span.org for the entire interview. professor super, what do you make from what you heard from congress and meadows? guest: we are like to see a series of rescission packages they get more and more controversial, and there certainly are reports that the way the house leadership wanted some of the votes they needed to pass the budget deal was by promising that the president would send out a number of rescissions. this argument that while they are not touching the building , hisassed this spring older money, isn't very persuasive because one of program has to spend the accommodation of their carryover money and their new appropriations. when they decide how much new money a program needs, they are often taking into account how much it has prior laws. host: teresa, a republican.

you are on the air. caller: i wonder when they are talking about what to spend where when mulvaney hasn't even handed over a budget yet. they have been waiting since april 15 for that and he has not done it. host: professor? process isbudget slowly underway in the congress and has gotten slower and slower with every passing year. budgetssults in final for the year often halfway through the year as happened this year. they certainly are working on budgets for the coming year. host: we had covered on c-span as many of the residents -- the president's cabinet secretary's on capitol hill testifying about their budget request before the appropriations committees, the hhs secretary was on capitol hill yesterday as well as the

interior secretary and the commerce secretary, so go to c-span.org and watch their testimony. jenny in fort wayne, indiana, democrat. my name is jenny and i wanted to comment on the bill as far as i can tell, the bill my s rescinded because of overspending inside our government and i do believe most people even though we got tax cuts was given the tax cuts for a very good reason, to build the economy. i think it's working. we have the lowest unemployment rates in a century. or more. probably aid it was lot of it due to the tax cuts. i think we are seeing growth, i don't think we need all the programs at the expense that we have been paying. i think it's a good thing and i

feel more confident than they had been a long time. to i think it surely helps do away with some of the programs, i don't think all of them, but definitely could come back. host: are we doing away with programs? guest: we are not generally doing away with programs. in some instances, smaller are being dealt very serious blows. i we may very well be dealing with getting better programs in the next package. there are some programs here that are longtime targets for certain interests in congress that are getting slashed rather badly. host: we go to robert next in baton rouge, louisiana. independent. keep up the good work.

super,d to ask mr. please compare [indiscernible] to seek the station. -- sequestration. it identifies money that is then appropriated but not committed and asks congress to pull it back. sequestration is a process of automatic across-the-board cuts with some sort of a target for spending control or deficit reductions. it's the ultimate blunt cuts at a wide point. can justify people sick was vision. -- sequestration. host: what about a line-item

veto? will: line-item veto essentially allow the president to do something very similar to rescissions, without involving would allow the president to veto particular appropriations one appropriations bills are sent to the president. the supreme court determined that is unconstitutional and that gives the president the ability to change law, which only congress can do. balanced budget amendment is a proposal that surfaces occasionally saying that congress would be limited in how much it could spend for the amount of money that is brought in and we have no idea how that would be enforced, which cuts would be made and who would decide, is the supreme court rewriting our budgets for us? there are a lot of concerns about that. host: denver, colorado, jonathan, a republican. caller: i just wanted a question on what the guest speakers ideas were on the bill?

guest: i'm concerned that this bill involves a great deal of theater which i don't think is constructive, cutting money that isn't going to be spent does not save anything. i also think the better approach is to reallocate money from programs where it is less needed to some of the programs that we know are underfunded. we know that low-income housing is badly underfunded for what it's being asked to do and the census bureau does not have the money they need to prepare for the next census. than engage in this kind of theater, i would encourage the administration on congress to redirect money for lower priority to higher priority programs, which presidents in the past have done. int: hank rutherford tweets republicans look desperate to rein in spending now and cut social programs before largetion but after that

tax cuts for millionaires, will it work? diana, democrat. caller: i have a simple question. is the money that's being rescinded actually there? or is it money that's going to be borrowed and why don't we --t ask every program to do to cut their budget by 10% to see how they can save money? that's what normal companies and normal people do, they try to save money. don't -- why do we have to resend money that's not they are , those are my questions. guest: the money is appropriated, so in that sense, it is there. it is true the federal government has a substantial deficit and is getting a fair amount of its money from taxes and a fair amount of its money from borrowing, but the money is there. in terms of across-the-board cuts, we have done that.

we did that was something called sequestration, across-the-board its under president obama and think a lot of people have been very disturbed with the effect of that. we pressed down this category of spending, discretionary spending to the lowest levels in more than half a century and the result of that has been a lot of things don't work very well. there are a lot of programs that have been cut past the point where we can get efficiencies out of them into the point where they are just not doing their job as well. host: professor super, we heard from the phone or with our reporter, that more rescission packages are coming in the freedom caucus chair would like to see the number more like $50 billion, $60 billion for these packages. what is your take on that effort? guest: it depends on what the packages are.

part of this package is pure theater, is not saving money at all, it's canceling money that would not be spent anyways. if you end up with a bigger version of that, then it's more theater but it doesn't affect the real world. i think what a lot of people expect and what senator meadows has in mind is that you start with this package and then move on to packages that make a much deeper cuts in programs that affect real people in the real world. host: david suber is a law professor at georgetown university law center. thank you for your time. when we come back, we open up the phone lines again and you can call it with any public policy or political issue. ♪ >>'s weekend on c-span saturday night at 8:30 eastern, the national rifle association leadership forum in dallas,

speakers include texas senators ted cruz and john cornyn and congressman richard hudson. sunday at 6:30 p.m., starbucks executive chair howard schultz on the responsibility of global on book tv on c-span2, saturday night in oneok eastern, author sally cohen talks with former cnn chief political correspondent candy crowley about where he gives. -- hate begins. and condoleezza rice at stanford's aim is a great on the future of american diplomacy. and on american history tv on c-span3, saturday night a hot eastern on the presidency, hillary clinton and linda ron johnson talk about the white house years of first lady betty ford and sunday at 2:00 p.m. eastern, cartoonists and legal experts discuss hustler magazine v falwell and its impact on editorial continuous -- cartoonists.

>> sunday morning on 1968, america in turmoil. we look at the cold war as the backdrop for the events of 1968, including the vietnam war, the presidential campaign, and the space race. joining us to talk about that turbulent time are elizabeth called, historian and markentary filmmaker and kramer, program director of the project on cold war studies at harvard university. watch 1968, american turmoil, live sunday at 8:30 a.m. eastern on c-span's "washington journal," and on american history tv on c-span3. "washington journal," continues. host: we are backing of phones until the top of the hour, we go to george in jacksonville, florida, a republican. good morning. >> good day.

debt as an interest associated with it. caller: as the interest rates of the world,, that payment will continue to go up. is reaching the point where is enough money to fund a 401(k) for every single person in the country, allowing all of the welfare spending to be put on the back burner and say if you need it, you get it in three days. when could massively cut this messes --ebt with the the methods that we have now in congress is dragging their feet on it. host: bernadette in new mexico, good morning, democrat. caller: i have a comment. if we really want to help individuals in the united states , americans or people who live in the united states, the most

powerful man in the world right now and we cannot say that is not true, president trump. president trump has the ability bureaus, the credit especially equifax, experian, trans union, all of them who identities,ised our not compromise our lives, they should be held accountable for partial money for people to get rid of their debt. us, therefore,o they should be held accountable. and president trump, whether you like him or not, and i did not vote for him, but whether you like him or not, he is the most powerful person right now, no one touches him. host: news from newspapers around the country, the palm beach post, trump considering a freshman congress and to lead pa -- the va.the

the position is still vacant after dr. ronny jackson withdrew his controversial nomination for the post. a statement released thursday afternoon, he says is an honor to be considered to serve my fellow veterans and their families at the highest possible level. he is among the list of candidates for the job heading an agency of 360,000 employees serving 9 million veterans and white house officials met with jeff miller on a republican who once led the house veterans affairs association committee. he asked his opinion of possible candidates during a dinner in december and you put in a good word for miller. he is obviously seeing all the issues that have come through in terms of constituents, i don't think there is somebody else that's on the shortlist that has more experience with seeing the complaints firsthand. it would be very helpful for a man like miller to fill that role. is a freshman lawmaker and we interviewed him for the

freshmen profile series here and you can learn more about him and , is anrs that he served ied expert, explosives expert and it's how he lost both of his legs serving this country. .ven learn more at c-span.org from the star advertiser out of hawaii, state of disaster, the governor asks the president for a federal declaration from the governor's office projects it will cost $2.9 million over the to protects residents and sauce could skyrocket if the air and sea evacuations become necessary. -- lawrom long events lava vents continued to pour out thursday. nevada lawmakers vowed to babylon, how will the protest by nevada's bipartisan congressional delegation were

drowned out thursday when the house voted overwhelmingly to pass a bill that would revise the licensing office on the department of energy's application to open yucca mountain. they will move forward to develop the site as a permanent depository for nuclear waste. 72 touse voted 340 to approve the act written by john shimkus of illinois, who put the licensing process for yucca mountain back on track after the obama admin version cut funding in 2011. harry reid, the democratic leader in the senate for democrats was in the senate, he -- a vocal opponent of opening of yucca mountain. mark in washington, d.c., and independent. caller: i was just looking at the numbers of how much money people are making nowadays on

people makeline eight hours $50 our work a 60 hour week and she has four people in his family counties making $25,000. these people and of taking food stamps and support, there's definitely a reason make eight hours $50 our work a 60 hour -- there's no reason for anybody to make $12 an hour. people want cuts everywhere and they are happy with the tax cuts but the people in the bottom in our country, the government has a responsibility to take care of them. having the minimum wage at seven dollars does not make any sense. all right, mark. teresa in tennessee, republican. caller: good morning. give me just a minute. all this outrage about what the person said about john mccain

dying, it was wrong, but my point being democrats and liberal media destroyed sarah palin, they wished she was raped , they thought her son should be , and i neverorted heard john mccain defends their palin or apologize for not any one of the comments that was and even nowher says he regrets that he even picked sarah palin. the democrats are being our moral authority and they cannot make us have compassion or care that john mccain is dying and my if it wasion is donald trump that was dying of cancer the way john mccain was, i sure do not believe there would be one to or word of sympathy for him for many

liberal democrat. the hypocrisy is overwhelming. host: an update on where the votes stand. no kaine of virginia is in on haskell's nomination. sentiments of john mccain, who says he opposes her because she would not call torture immoral during her testimony. going over the vote stands come democrats voting yes or likely yes, joe manchin has said he would do so and democrats who are undecided, claire mccaskill, mazie hirono of hawaii, heidi heitkamp, bob menendez, joe donnelly who is up for reelection, vermont senator , patty murray of washington, dick durbin of illinois, the center minority , denny 70,k schumer

, youardin, sherrod brown can see the list goes on. democrats voting no or likely , ron senator tim kaine wyden, maria cantwell, jon tester, i'm not a fan of waterboarding he told cnn. andtor tammy duckworth dianne feinstein, i will not vote to confirm gina haspel as the next director of central intelligence agency, the cia's retention, detention, and interrogation program is one of the darkest chapters in our nations history and it must not be repeated. senator martin heinrich, if you can't admit or recognize that mistakes were made, that makes a question whether you're going to be able to avoid those mistakes in the future. , camillaernie sanders harris -- kamala

harris. paullicans voting no, rand , john mccain, he advised the senate to reject likely that voting is john mccain, he revised the senate to reject her nomination. paul , john mccain, heand then here f those republicans who have not set yet how they plan to vote. you can go to cnn if you'd like to learn more. michael in new york, democrat. caller: good morning. , a lotwanted to comment of folks keep talking about the tax break for the wealthy or the upper middle class. my sincere hope is that the democrats actually take this cut for and look for a people in the democratic states. living in new york or california, we're not getting a tax cut, we're seeing a sizable increase. we have to work with local governments offices at the state

level and local level. to try and formulate a state tax plan that will allow us to basically restore some of the tax breaks that we had previously gotten. this whole idea of spending so much time in congress debating doldrums appointments -- donald trump's appointments is ridiculous. were pickede people by donald trump and for the most part are credible people and based on this my new ship of bouncing back and forth on waterboarding, torture and such is just a waste of time from the perspective of many of the people here in new york, because at the end of the day, we are going to see huge tax increases. michael, you may be interested in the economy business section of the washington post, gop sees tax cut is a winning issue, but does the public?

claire is in memphis, tennessee, and independent. things.two for the republican woman who said what is it with donald trump who have cancer, what if it was obama who had cancer, think about that for a second. and its teacher appreciation week and i just wanted to say that as a teacher, i think we are grossly underpaid and considering all the people you look around and ask anyone sitting next to you, where your kids -- at school. we pay the people who take care of our kids and teach them and enlighten them next to nothing and i think that is shameful of our country and we should pay teachers more. if they didn't have to worry about death and loans, they can focus so much more on their career and maybe make it even better people than we already make, despite the fact that we barely get paid squat. clare in tennessee. kyle in buffalo, new york. a republican. caller: just following up on claire, a teacher as well, they

require us with a masters, so based on the, we should be getting paid more. i just want to mention something about -- a lot people keep talking about the we gave them money. we didn't give them money. we gave back the money that we took from them from sanctions years ago. when people call in and say we gave around money. we didn't really give the money, we gave back, go teachers. host: here's a tweet this ceo has put out a statement saying hired michael: was it -- michael cohen was a mistake. there's a statement by the at&t ceo saying it was a mistake to hire him to do so. janice and hudson, florida, democrat. like a i just would

point of clarification. on the food stamp issues, on school breakfast is and lunches, is that doubled having in some aspect? -- i forgot my second issue. on insurance, they keep saying we need wic for the children, but wasn't everybody's supposed to have insurance? why are they having shoved for children and obamacare it ever was supposed to be insured? host: here's a story in politico about the president's yesterday --eting those prisoners american prisoners of north korea here when they landed in the headline is trump freeze jailed americans overseas but endangers others in this piece

is written by the hall to see. president donald trump managed to do to strangely dr. dre things, he won the release of three imprisoned americans while seeking a nuclear deal with north korea but he also prolongs the captivity of several other americans by quitting a nuclear deal with iran hours before greeted thehantly men released from north korea, a man pleaded not to forget his family. it underlines the heart wrenching role president -- prisoners can play in diplomacy. more than a dozen americans are believed imprisoned and at least three countries on what human baselessvocates call charges as president trump who considers himself a master

negotiator finds himself bargaining for real estate, but for human lives. the most important thing is patients, said gerald fierstein, a former senior state department official. you don't want to make the other party think you would do something to get the prisoners released, because if you raise the value of the prisoners, you get into a situation where it becomes more difficult, not less, to get them released. patience is not trump's signature trait and he has shown little of it when it comes to iran. 46-year-old and 81-year-old have been held in iran on vague espionage charges wants trump to keep talking to iran and says the u.s. president should consider a prisoner exchange with the iranians. james in fredericksburg, virginia, republican. caller: thanks for taking my call. democrats have been a be careful, you might get what you want. if we got someone back in office like the last administration william administration prior to

that and the administration prior to that in the administration prior to that, we will be going in the totally wrong direction and whether we are going to the right direction now, it appears as though we are. , they getteachers go incredible outrageous amount of time off, the amount of children who arrive at the station where they can succeed in life is overrated and if you want to get a great pay, you need to produce children -- if i had a car that performed like children perform, i would blame mymechanic, especially if car lived with the mechanic all day long every day is this woman said, where your children. i don't believe in teachers. james in fredericksburg, virginia. the follow-up on an earlier viewer who was talking about food stamps, here's a headline in the hill newspaper, the house plans to vote on a farm bill

that includes a food stamps revamp next week. rick in texas. caller: thank you for taking my call. was i the only one who noticed when president trump was welcoming the asian-americans home, he didn't say welcome home, he said welcome and he caused, to this country. that indicated his racism to me. nominate mr.to abaadi for person of the year himmaybe stormy can spank with the time magazine in this picture. the president as he was referring to welcoming home those americans that were imprisoned in north korea on the tarmac yesterday. at andrews air force base, they

talked to reporters and we have coverage of that if you go to c-span.org, you listen to what the president had to say in his own words and some of those asian-americans were also asked questions as well. john in trenton, new jersey, democrat. in donaldm interested trump doing more for the government like you did for the koreans. he should be doing that for iran and other places. points for to gain the united states, he should stop with this business about the special prosecutor not being able to do his job and if he was completely innocent on that deal, i would have been before mr. mueller testify my truth. i don't see it. i don't care about stormy daniels or anybody else.

i care about the russians. and gett the deal done back to doing government for the people, by the people. and hang this whole situation up. thank you very much. below the fold of the "washington post," at four hannity properties, eviction threats. he has a vast portfolio of rental properties in working-class neighborhoods in a describe those holdings in compassionate terms saying he invests in places that quote otherwise might struggle to receive such support. post,"washington analysis says managers at the largest apartment complex in georgia have taken unusually aggressive approach to rent collection. they sought court-ordered evictions at twice the statewide rate in a state known for high numbers of infections and

--dlord cleanly -- friend high number of evictions in a landlord friendly state. in the conflict between iran and israel, the new york times this morning has a peak, the big lord -- the bigger conflict behind the cross-border classes -- clashes in syria. why is a ron in syria? high number of-- iran in syria? against syrian rebels and helped government forces against the islamic state. iran has taken advantage of the chaos to build a substantial military structure -- infrastructure. vincent advisors from its toerful revolutionary guard syrian military bases. even though syrian rebels have lost ground and no clear threats remain, iran and its allies have stated syria, greeting military

and for structure that israel sees as a threat. iran continues to train and equip fighters while strengthening ties with shiite allies in iraq and has a lot in lebanon in hopes of building a united front in the event of a new war. david irvine, california, a democrat. good morning. caller: i just wanted to make a comment on social security. after this irresponsible tax break, they are probably going to come -- republican's are going to come after social security and medicare. social security is not an entitlement. medicaid is. but we have to get out there and get those republicans out of office, they are getting their paycheck, they are getting their health care and they don't care about us. you, all you people not to get out there and vote and get those republicans out or they are going to take an ax to social security. and we are going to be hurting.

bernie sanders sends his best. do not vote republican, they will take a whistle security, wait and see. host: dave in california. when will leave it there for this morning's "washington journal." we will be back tomorrow. things were watching and enjoy the rest of your weekend. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2018] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] talkesident trump will about prescription drug prices and will be appearing at an event in the white house rose garden live coverage begins at 2:00 p.m. eastern and sarah sanders will be briefing reporters this afternoon as well

, now scheduled for 2:30 p.m. we will have live coverage when she gets underway hero c-span. james comey was fired one year ago this week, join us later today when he will talk about that and other issues covered in his book, "a higher loyalty," truth, and leadership. this weekend on c-span's saturday night at 8:30 eastern, the national rifle association leadership forum in dallas. speakers include texas senators ted cruz and john cornyn and congressman richard hudson. starbucks executive chair howard schultz on the responsibility of global companies. on "book tv" on c-span2 at saturday --

>> c-span, where history unfolds daily. in 1979, c-span was created as a public service by america's cable television companies. and today we continue to bring you unfiltered coverage of congress, the white house, the supreme court, and public policy